Crop residue is conventionally plowed under in the spring or fall using a moldboard. It is known from U.S. Pat. No. 3,913,502 to prepare a poorly drained field of heavy yet erodible soil such as clay loam on which a previous crop such as corn has been grown in ridges by the method of removing the crop residue from the ground, shredding the stalks by means such as a flail type shredder, forming ridges in the ground using hilling discs, and redepositing the shredded stalks and trash in the valley between the ridges for the purpose of water conservation and to improve warming of the soil in the spring. Such method requires use of a relatively expensive shredder and considerable energy to operate the shredder, and the shredder and hilling discs can only process a few crop rows during each pass across the field.
A plow having a scraper attachment is also known from U.S. Pat. No. 308,920, but the crop residue from use of such scraper attachment is buried when the plow bottom turns over the adjacent crop row.